Businesses play a crucial role in restoring and protecting biodiversity, as their operations are linked to nature along their supply chain. CircHive Project offers tools for organisations to measure and assess their environmental impact.
Businesses have an important role to play in restoring nature and protecting its resources and services. Over half of the world’s gross domestic product (GPD) is moderately or highly dependent on nature (World Economic Forum 2020).
Agriculture, forestry, fishery, ecotourism, and pharmaceuticals are only some of the sectors that depend on healthy ecosystems, but all businesses rely on nature in some way or another.
Floods, extreme wildfires, droughts and other natural disasters can damage crops and infrastructures and disrupt supply chains; the impacts of the climate crisis are increasing the frequency of those events. Therefore, businesses should be at the forefront of tackling biodiversity loss to ensure sustainability, enhance reputation, comply with regulations, and capitalise on economic benefits.
A new way for businesses
Textile consumption in the European Union generated about 270 kg of CO2 emissions per person in 2020 (European Environment Agency 2023), but only one per cent of used clothes are recycled. Globally, that means that USD 500 billion has been lost due to the lack of recycling and under-utilised clothes (Ellen MacArthur Foundation, A new textiles economy: Redesigning fashion’s future 2017).
The circular economy is gaining more attention and attracting textile and fashion companies to reduce their environmental impact. Transitioning from take-make-waste to a circular economy has challenges and opportunities (Koszewska 2018), but through commitment, innovation and collaboration, businesses can grow economically and protect biodiversity.
Banks and investors can be catalysts. By directing funding to promote biodiversity gain over biodiversity loss, banks can better support investee companies in transitioning to sustainable business models. Guides like the PRB Nature Target Setting Guidance serve as a compass to help banks add biodiversity initiatives to their work.
Sustainable forest management is crucial to biodiversity. In the last decades, new opportunities have been created for managing and using forests for non-wood forest products (NWFP), eco-tourism, payment for ecosystem services, and forest carbon markets. Wood remains important for traditional uses, but forest-based biomass, as well as nature overall, is a source of innovations for new products and solutions. Thus, companies adopting new strategies and seeing biodiversity as a business opportunity ensure long-term economic sustainability, enhance the resilience of forest ecosystems and social benefits, and secure resources for future generations.
A call to action for businesses
Changes in biodiversity can impact economies, revenues and costs, so it has become increasingly important and relevant for incorporating in investment decisions. Both regulatory measures, such as the EU Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive, and market-based voluntary initiatives seek to direct attention to businesses’ impacts and dependencies on nature.
Economies should be embedded in nature; without nature, there’s no economy, said Juha Siikamäki, Chief Economist at the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) during CircHive’s Helsinki Biodiversity Day on 23 May 2024.
Horizon Europe project CircHive aims to invite public and private stakeholders wanting to discuss and learn how to measure and assess their impact on nature. Visit the website and join the BeeHive to collaborate with CircHive in exploring methods for working on biodiversity footprinting and natural capital accounting.
References
World Economic Forum. 2020. Nature Risk Rising: Why the Crisis Engulfing Nature Matters for Business and the Economy. 36p. Available at: https://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_New_Nature_Economy_Report_2020.pdf
European Environment Agency. 2023. The impact of textile production and waste on the environment (infographics). Available at: https://www.europarl.europa.eu/topics/en/article/20201208STO93327/the-impact-of-textile-production-and-waste-on-the-environment-infographics
Koszewska, M. 2018. Circular Economy — Challenges for the Textile and Clothing Industry, Autex Research Journal, v. 18, pp. 337-347. https://doi.org/10.1515/aut-2018-0023
Ellen MacArthur Foundation. 2017. A new textiles economy: Redesigning fashion’s future. 40p. Available at: https://www.ellenmacarthurfoundation.org/a-new-textiles-economy
Additional reading
Deutz, A., Heal, G. M., Niu, R., Swanson, E., Townshend, T., Zhu, L., Delmar, A., Meghji, A., Sethi, S. A., and Tobin-de la Puente, J. 2020. Financing Nature: Closing the global biodiversity financing gap. The Paulson Institute, The Nature Conservancy, and the Cornell Atkinson Center for Sustainability.
Dasgupta, P. 2021. The Economics of Biodiversity: The Dasgupta Review. London: HM Treasury.
FISE. 2024. Sustaining Europe’s forest biodiversity: Preservation, Management and Restoration.
Bioregions Facility. 2024. What are the barriers to investment in the forest sector?